Searching for Reasonably Priced Uncured Ham

We like to city cure our own hams, and are hoping to do a few for gifts for the hols this year. For that, we're looking for a good, reasonably priced source of for uncured hams around the W. Sea/Burien area. (Previously, we've sourced them from a pretty cool Asian market in Everett where they are $1.79-1.99/lb, but are hoping to find a closer option.)

Know any good places to ham up the hols nearby? We'd love to know about em'.

We have not had a chance to talk with The Live Butcher or B & E Meats yet, both of which sounds awesome. However, we have found out the following, in case anyone else is on the lookout:
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- Skagit River Ranch, which comes to the W Sea Farmer's Market (this Sun the last trip of the year) has pork leg for $6.75/lb, with the legs about 23 lbs each - The animals are grass fed and the meat sounds fabulous. eiko@cnw.com or eiko@skagitriverranch.com for more info
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- QFC will special order pork legs, if they are available. The one near us, on SW Barton, charges $2.99/lb, and will debone for you. The legs are typically around 15 lbs. You will need to allow at least a few days lead time.
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- Fred Meyers will also special order for you, again with a need to allow a few days lead time. At the Burien store, their legs are only $1.89/lb, and they can debone for you if the right people are in store. The average size will vary depending on who they source from when you call.
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- Carnicieria El Paisano has legs in stock and will prepare them bone in or bone out, skin on or skin off. They charge $2.79/lb and their sizes range from ~12 to just over 20 lbs/leg. They seemed to have a very knowledgeable and friendly staff, and a good variety of meat cuts. We understand they also have outstanding tamales.
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- At $10/lb, The Swinery was the most expensive option we found nearby, but they also had us wanting to buy their noms. We spoke with Kim, who was very much about doing things the way the customer wanted and very pleasant to talk with. She assured us their Carlton Farms sourced pork is the best you'll ever taste, and we tended to believe she knew that of which she spoke. Plus, they'll pretty much truss it up however you like (bone in/bone out, skin on/skin off, etc.) - Further, this place cures its own bacon - and you can even request flavor/style combos and they'll see what they can do, smokes its own turkey and generally sounds like it is filled with merry mongers of all things meaty. They also have lunch options and saucy type things available - We were pleased to have found them, even though we won't be picking up holiday hams from them this year. : - )
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Happy Hammy Hols!
- Heather and Joe

At $1.80 to $2.00/lb for uncured ham your choices are limited to maybe Cash and Carry..and Winco...to go from that to the Swinery is head-spinning. When you asked about uncured ham at $2/lb, I didn't mention the Swinery. You did not ask for uncured ham in general. You asked about *cheap* uncured ham. The subsequent cognitive dissonance renders me nearly mute. Bill the butcher in green lake or whole foods or Albertsons are pretty the same. Why ask?

Why ask? Why, to see what would happen if we radically experimented with crowdsourcing information regarding porcine procurement, of course! In lab tests, using our own best guesses and a Turing machine powered by bacon and pork cracklins just was not working out. So, we expanded the test set! In so doing, we asked here and in a few other forums because, radically enough, we thought other area people might have good recommendations for merry meat mongers. The results: We actually found quite a few places with uncured ham @ around $2/lb, and settled on the Carciniera, which has its own butcher shop and seemed to know its stuff. (Of course, few experiments rarely being able to consider all variables, we never checked WinCo or Cash and Carry, but might next time if they have decent looking butcher areas, are nearby, and produce advantageous sounding results when fed through the Cracklins Turing Machine.) As it turned out, using the radical formula of neighborhood recommendations coupled with calls for details specific to our request produced the desired results. As the great experimenters that we are, we can never say, "why ask?" Rather, in the great search for meat meccas, we must always, at the very least, say, "why not ask?" ; - )

My apologies. I am glad to know that Carcinieria has such cheap uncured ham. Cheap ham, in my experience, is worth what you pay for it. Expensive ham as in the Swinery department where every pig has a name is an entirely different world...so much so that there is no overlap. (My favorite ham is the Kurobuta ham at MM) Hence my confusion. Good luck with your city cure.

Hmm - Having urban dictionar'ied DBP http://www.urbandictionary.com/define.php?term=dbp&page=2 I think that unless there is some perfectly innocent porcine term it could be related to, no detailed explanations are needed - could not find any abbr that particularly related to ham (unless one wants to make a duck billed platypus ham?) or that most ppl would want around a family holiday dinner (hopefully ppl are leaving the douche bag pills @ home, 4 instance) ; - P ; - )

With all due respect to the real DBP...whom I don't know personally...I poked fun at the title...because it just sounded like him.

He is likely an expensive turkey without any cure in real life..

To the many here that know him and his contributions to the forum would simply agree he has a decent minded affable & creative character...who makes you think, laugh, wonder, and scratch your head...a lot in the same post.